


( cotard's syndrome )

by Acacius



Category: Boku dake ga Inai Machi | 僕だけがいない街 | ERASED - The Town Where Only I am Missing, 僕だけがいない街 | ERASED
Genre: 2nd person POV, Character Study, Child Abuse, Gen, Suicide mention, gotta write for this loser i can't help it, will add tags as needed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-29
Updated: 2016-03-29
Packaged: 2018-05-29 21:58:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,577
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6395482
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Acacius/pseuds/Acacius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Imagine this: you’re ten years old and you’re already dead. No one mourns for you, no one sees the death in your eyes or the way your smile is never a smile, but a smirk. All you can do is take in a breath and feel the rattle of your dead bones; in a world of monsters and men, you lie somewhere in their midst, more dead than alive— Gaku Yashiro character study.</p>
            </blockquote>





	( cotard's syndrome )

**Author's Note:**

> so i love bokudake... and this loser. i hope you all enjoy this little vignette. i'll be uploading 3 chapters, each detailing a part of yashiro's life. let me know what you think if you get a chance! thanks~

“ I see him as one of those pitiful things, sometimes born in hospitals. They feed it, keep it warm, but they don’t put it on the machines. They let it die. But he doesn’t die. He looks normal and nobody can tell what he is. ”  
\- Red Dragon, Thomas Harris  
.  
. 

 

You become a lure. 

Dressed in muted feathers and simple twine, the bait is cast into the stream. The line tugs and you provide the fish. It is different from hunting; you are not actively searching for these girls. No, there is no hunt, no game of cat and mouse. 

These girls are nothing to you and you wonder occasionally if there is something wrong with you. You are walking home one night from an evening cram session and you see a few drunkards kicking a homeless man in the face. No, you realize. You aren’t broken—you are just one of the few who accepts their own nature. 

The violence reminds you of your older brother. Two years older and twice as vicious, you are glad that he is the problem child. Your parents almost forget you exist. They are so mild-mannered, so soft-spoken and hypocritically kind that you imagine stabbing a kitchen knife through both of them. 

You don’t, of course. Before bed you give your mother a quick peck on the cheek that she returns, wrap your arms around your father for a hug, bid them goodnight, and amble up the steps to your room. It is then that you rub your mother’s lipstick from your face, annoyance apparent on your features. 

It’s not love that clutches your heart—maybe obligation? Whatever it is, you do not harm your parents. Your brother does that enough. He is a tornado, belligerent and cruel, unnecessarily crass, and generally, a horrible human being. But he is your older brother and even you cannot escape the hint of affection you feel for him. All younger siblings look up to their older siblings in some way and you are not the exception. 

When your brother is occupied, his anger is redirected. He becomes the only kindness you have. He buys you juice from the vending machine and sometimes lets you hold onto his sleeve as you cross a busy street. It’s nice, you think, being needed. So you practice picking up those girls, studying their behaviors. 

You have a little notebook that you write in between classes, observing the other children who flock to the teacher once they’ve finished their assignments. 

-Girls like kindness as much as gifts  
-A shared hobby is an easy way to become friends (ex: join volleyball club to meet with your new target)  
-Never raise your voice  
-Learn to smile better  
-Laugh or make jokes  
-Hold their hands when walking across streets 

You find that it’s the little things that culminate trust. A girl leaves her gloves at home one winter morning; you give her your own and trudge through the snow with obvious discomfort. Another makes a happy comment about your scarf and you gladly wrap it around you both, walking her somewhere where there is a beautiful frozen lake. 

There is no lake—just a shed and a scream and sobs. Then, there is nothing but silence. 

.  
. 

You are simply doing your brother a great service. That’s what family is for, after all. You remember this even as his fist (disgusting, perverted, and clammy) collides with your cheek. You are spent sprawling onto the wooden floor of the shed. Your knees buckle and it takes a considerable amount of time until you can stand up again. It seems like the bruises and scrapes on your knees never do get enough time to heal. 

You taste copper on your tongue and move to wipe the blood with your sleeve. Eyes blank (like always), you look up to your brother. A spider’s thread dangles from his head. You blink and it disappears. 

Not yet. 

“What did you do?” It is an accusation, not a question. 

But you’ve done nothing. It’s the ghost of his fingers around her neck, purple splotches nearly black in the dying light. It’s his overwhelming urge to hurt and take that leaves the girl without breath. 

You say nothing. 

Together, you lift the body into the crate, slamming the lid down with a sigh. You look at your brother. His hands are shaking. He runs out of the shed and vomits. You follow behind, picking up Spice’s cage. 

In your room, you watch Spice clamber into his wheel, giving little squeaks as he trots forward. You reward him with sunflower seeds. The feeling of the hamster’s teeth against your fingertips tickles and you laugh, genuine mirth in your voice. 

Animals don’t care if you’ve lured a girl to her death or that you’re unsure if you can truly experience any emotion, or that you imagine killing people. As long as you’ve given them food, water, and shelter, they’re bound to you, forever loyal. It’s nice, you decide, to be appreciated like that. 

“Let’s have some fun, Spice!” 

You no longer need your brother. 

A few nights later, you enter your brother’s room. You take in a deep breath and shake his shoulders. He jolts awake, dark eyes wide with fear before a calmness overtakes him— then rage. 

“What the fuck are you doing in my room?” 

You hear what he doesn’t say in the way he does not look at your face, but scans the dark of his own room. 

I thought you were the police. Don’t scare me. I had another nightmare of the girl pulling me into a grave. Oh god, what have I done…

You tug on his sleeve, the picture of innocence. “I checked the storeroom. The body’s gone!” 

He grimaces, pushing you onto the floor before pulling on his pants. “If you’re lying, I’ll kill you.” 

You nod, following lightly behind him. The spider’s thread above his head glimmers in the moonlight as he slides the door to the shed open. He does not notice the noose dangling near the crate. He does not notice that you’ve closed the door, or that you’ve got a cement block tied to the end of the rope. Like a pulley, you drop the cement block from the stepladder once you’ve gotten the rope around your brother’s neck. 

He fights like a bull for a good minute, eyes bulging out against his hollow face. He claws at the rope and you smile sweetly, watching as he dies. 

A final breath escapes him and then, the spiders thread breaks. You can hear the wire give a snap and its like a weight in the shape of your brother has been lifted from your chest. 

.  
. 

Your mother finds his body in the morning while you are asleep. She cries—even your father does. Your brother’s face is plastered on every newspaper and TV channel. He would have loved the attention if he wasn’t currently rotting in a shallow grave. 

They find the body of the girl too and you are rushed to a child psychologist. 

“These sort of things run in families.” A tepid police officer explains, not knowing what he’s saying. 

You did not ‘become’ anything. You simply ‘are.’ 

But you go for a few sessions, all smiles and bright-eyed. You explain that your brother hit you, yelled a lot, but he wasn’t all bad. You recite all the times he had bought you juice or gone with you to get ice-cream or taken you to the pet store to get feed for Spice. 

The poor woman takes pity on you—a mistake that many others will make. She gives you a clean bill of mental health and your parents nearly cry with relief. You show no visible signs of conduct disorder or anger management problems. No history of violence against others or animals, no fire-setting, no misplaced attachment. 

And so, like Spice, you trot through the wheel of academia, making it to middle school. Your parents sell the house, and you are not confronted with the ghosts of your brother or the girl. 

You receive no divine punishment, until one day in class when you stare out the window and catch your reflection. 

A spider’s thread dangles from the crown of your head and you excuse yourself from class. It is easy enough to climb up to the roof of the school, to climb over the guard railing and spread your arms out. 

You imagine falling into the early morning traffic. You imagine your body hitting one of the cars below, the screams that would follow. 

You toe the edge, before an epiphany hits. 

You’ve always known this: you are dead. You’ve been dead for a very long time. 

When you killed your brother, however, you felt something different. You felt what it must feel like to be alive. That rush of adrenaline, the way your breathing hitched and your heart thudded rapidly in your ears. 

You climb back over the railing. 

Not today. Maybe someday you’d find yourself on the edge of the world, arms spread to accept the ground below. Maybe you’d even smile through it all when the spider’s thread breaks. 

But today you are Gaku Yashiro, 7th year student, a well-liked and smart boy known for his kindness. 

When you return to class, you see that the girl sitting in front of you has a spider’s thread dangling from her head. 

You smile and introduce yourself.


End file.
